HYDERABAD, March 31: Members of a scheduled caste community blocked the Auto Bhan Road here on Tuesday after a massive fire gutted their huts, set up on army farmland.

The fire broke out at around 1.30 pm and engulfed all the 20 huts made of straw, destroying them completely and burning standing crops and two goats. People of the area rushed to the spot and started rescue operation. A fire tender also arrived there and extinguished the fire after two-hour long efforts.

According to an affected man, Soom Lal, nobody knew how the fire broke out. The affected families, demanding compensation, blocked the road as a result the vehicular traffic remained suspended for two hours.

The affected people included Madhu, Laung, Chota Laung, Diya, Mom Ji, Bijal, Nangar, Walyar, Raya, Mala, Veer Ji, Matto, Bhoora and Madli. Mr Lal said that the families were earlier settled in Machhi Goth and later shifted to the farmland of the Sindh Regimental Centre.

GUTKA: The Hyderabad Circuit Bench of the Sindh High Court here on Wednesday issued pre-admission notices to the Sindh health authorities after the manufacturing licences of mainpuri and gutka manufacturers were suspended by the health department.

The petition was jointly filed by manufacturers and sellers seeking renewal of their licenses, which had been suspended by the district health authorities. On an identical petition the court directed the district health authorities to collect samples from factories of the petitioners and other manufacturers in the presence of a magistrate, and get them examined from the laboratories of the Pakistan Council for Scientific and Industrial Research.